The Wrong Girl

Perhaps the high point of our visit to Utah last week was getting to see our granddaughter, Savannah … aka Savy … perform with her cheer squad, the Elite Academy Heat.  The competition was held in the massive Salt Palace in downtown Salt Lake on a huge, multimedia stage in a room as large as an airplane hangar.  The official word was that no video taping was allowed but can anyone really prevent parents from video recording their kids in an age when nearly every device can record videos?   Before each performance, a group of parents from the team performing would make its way to the front of the stage to take pictures and videos.  I decided to do the same for Savy’s. I’d brought my Panasonic Lumix camera, which takes very good videos and offers the choice of a viewfinder or the view screen as a means of seeing what I’m recording.  As Savy’s team was announced, I moved to the edge of the stage and decided to use the viewfinder because that usually allows me to hold the camera more steady (at the expense of a tiny-tiny image).

As the number started, I had the camera in photo mode, so I missed the first few seconds while I switched to movie mode.  I followed Savy around the stage through the team numbers then tracked her tumbling run but as she rejoined the group, I lost sight of her through the viewfinder.  I took my eye from the viewfinder for a few seconds to locate her again (during which I got a wonderful shot of the front edge of the stage) then started filming again.  I watched the video on the camera afterward and was satisfied that I had a pretty good video of Savy’s performance.   So I thought.   Two days later, sitting in my daughter’s kitchen, I transferred the video to my laptop so I could see it on a larger screen.  It looked great until Savy’s tumbling run at which point I realized I’d followed The Wrong Girl.  Understandable, I suppose, since there are four or five little blondies on the team that look nearly identical in costume and make-up, especially through a viewfinder.  Understandable but disappointing.  Such are the best laid plans of mice and (older) men.

Here’s the first minute or so of the show, before I stared taping The Wrong Girl … a heart will appear on the screen occasionally to show you where Savy is.

Ain’t she cute?

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Tags: entertainment, family, grandchildren, gratitude, smiles

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